Annakarinaland

2017-03-17

Dorothy Arzner’s
films were marginalized by male film historians until the advent of women’s
film festivals in the mid 1970’s. The first major and largely anecdotal accounts
of American cinema by male film historians omitted or glossed over her career:
Andrew Sarris: “The American Cinema: Directors and Directions, 1929-1968”
(1968- Arzner completely omitted); Kevin Brownlow’s “The Parades Gone By”
(1968); Lewis Jacobs, “The Rise of the American Film” (1939, reprinted 1967).
Her films have been the subject of scholarship and film retrospectives, richly
documented in essays and books by feminist film theorists and historians since
the 1970’s.

When Arzner was
rediscovered in women’s film festivals in the 70’s, in part promoted by British
feminist film theorist Claire Johnston, her historical place in film history was
well motivated by the body of work she had done between 1929-1943 above all how
her characters challenge the fixed gender roles of women in film and open these
films up to contradictions. They show women transgressing their roles and seeking
fulfillment. Feminist film theory was taught at universities and colleges since the 80's and her work is currently discussed, especially with a slew of new retrospectives.

Maureen O'Hara and Lucille Ball in 'Dance Girl Dance'

Dorothy Arzner is
relatively unknown in France and feminist film theory nearly non existent. So
it is with some alarm that she was introduced rather poorly by the Cinématèque Française for an upcoming retrospectivewith problematic - and protested -program notes on a revised ahistorical account of Arzner.

Libération journalist Philippe Garnier reviewed six
of her films in 2003 while in Los Angeles and was called on to write the
program notes for a retrospective of her films at the Cinématèque Française from March 22 to April 1, a bastion of male
film history with only six retrospectives dedicated to women since 2005 out of
around 300. Fortunately, Garnier does not speak for “Créteil Films de Femmes” whose
parallel Arzner retrospective (March 10-19) precedes the program af Cinématèque Française. A round table with
myself representing the Cinema and Women’s Studies Department at City College
of San Francisco and Cahiers du Cinema
film critic Ariel Schweitzerwas held for the audience who would later continue on at Cinématèque
Française. This discussion was crucial in bringing this work to
its proper light. Créteil has previously showcased Arzner’s work on two
occasions in the 80s since the inaugural festival of 1979 in Sceaux, which later moved
to Créteil.

Katherine Hepburn in 'Christopher Strong' 1933

Garnier’s
overview of Arzner’s work supplies superficial character analyses from her
films, which generally fragment in meaningless rhetoric. There are
problematic comments about Arzner’s appeal to “militant lesbians”, and swipes
at Arzner and Zoë Akins (Akins wrote scripts
for Arzner)for their “closeted” careers in the male
dominated studio system of the1920’s and 1930’s Hollywood. (Lesbian) feminists that emulate Arzner or “recent attempts to make her a secret
heroine of the feminist struggle” are problematic for Garnier. Arnzer is characterized as a
“butch” director who spent her time advancing
the careers of actresses. He criticizes Arzner’s male characters who are either
“pathetic or alcoholic” and elevates erotic pre-code scenes with Pansy Gray (Ruth
Chatterton) in “Anybody’s Woman” (1930) who straddles a ukulele in an erotic
pose (1930) , which he considered her best film, or Bubble’s (Lucille
Ball) in “Dance Girl Dance” (1940) who performs a hula dance for a lecherous nightclub
owner. Garnier's introduction of Dorothy Arzner for the Cinémateque Française
retrospective to spectators who do not know about her work is annoying, as are snide
attacks on lesbian feminists who identify with her public image, or the
screening of her films in academia and educational institutions and festivals.

Clara Bow in 'The Wild Party'

Why elevate an
historical figure while vulgarizing the work? Why commodify a retrospective
with revisionist history? Phillipe
Garnier claims that Arzner was successful because of two reasons: she had“f---k
you money” to play with , i.e. was so wealthy she really didn’t need to work, like
Zoe Akins and it infers they bought their way into the business. Secondly, she became a director as a result of a network of women artisans in
the film industry in the 1920’s. However, it was Arzner’s competent efforts and
the contacts she made at Paramount that made her director before the union jobs
that came with the big studios after this period. That Arzner remains after
this time and for 20 years in the emerging Hollywood studio system is extraordinarily
remarkable.